Working in public relations in the gaming world is a terrible job. If gamers …

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Working in the PR business is a thankless, grinding thing. When you slip up, everyone knows about it. When do you well, no one thinks about it. The point of the PR professional in gaming is simple: to get a publisher's games talked about, and to get review scores that are as high as possible. That can lead to some borderline villainous behavior, and to a bad reputation for the job as a whole.

So it's no coincidence that game writers tend to have an antagonistic relationship with the PR industry. We're going to throw out all the bad stories and the stereotypes and focus on the three most important strategies for good PR. These are simple things that go deeper than simply following gaming writers on Twitter, and are much more effective. Why isn't everyone doing them? Well, let's take a look.

Be a part of the company you're representing.

When looking for sources for this story, the thing that stuck out was that of the public relations professionals that gaming writers enjoyed working with, almost all were internal, not simply a contractor with an outside firm.

While stressing that both internal and external PR had merit, Aram Jabbari, the manager of Public Relations and Sales for Atlus USA, spoke strongly about the merits of developers having internal PR resources.

"With as many games as we have, and as involved as the majority of them are—being RPGs and all—it becomes vital to have quick, efficient exchange of information, and to be able to have questions answered rapidly," he explained. "With an internal PR team, knowledge exchange is more rapid, and the folks tasked with communicating to the gaming public and press end up being in a much better position in terms of having an intimate understanding of the games. It’s also certainly easier to attempt wittiness when the responsibility for the effort failing rests squarely on one set of shoulders."

Jabbari is near legendary in the world of game writing for press releases that are actually fun to read, e-mails that are answered promptly, and the ease with which even smaller news outlets have received review samples. Being that easy to work with, mixed with a deep knowledge of his product, makes Jabbari extremely effective at his job: getting gaming writers to write about Atlus games.

The next person we talked to was Garth Chouteau, the senior director of Public Relations with PopCap games, and he had even stronger words for internal PR. "I'd go so far as to say that in-house PR is virtually always better than outside support via contractor or agency," he told Ars. "The opportunity to completely immerse oneself in the product or service in question is always more possible from within the company proper. Sure, an agency or contractor can be a valuable source of fresh ideas and perspective from time to time, but in general, in-house is the way to go. This is probably even more true in the video games industry, where really being familiar with the products/services you represent is critical."

Which brings us to the next point...

Play your own games

"Oh, you gotta drink the kool-aid, no question. First, this is invaluable for enabling the communications professional to put him/herself in the shoes of the consumer... If you don't know what's great about your games, how are you really going to communicate the benefits to consumers?" Chouteau told Ars.

"Second, and no less important, [it is important] for the purposes of being able to speak intelligently to the journalists who write about video games. I make a point of having played at least 100 hours of each of our games before any journalist sees them. And since a small number of long-lead publications need access to each game 3-4 months prior to official launch, I'm playing very early builds and watching each game 'evolve' as it nears the finish line. It's a very cool perspective to have and it helps inform my conversations with journalists as they experience the game...I can actually say 'ya know, we tried that idea in an earlier build of the game, but it simply wasn't as much fun' and so forth."

Jabbari also stresses the importance of playing the product. "How can you explain to someone how exciting a new innovation or feature is if you have no concept of its significance? How can you persuade someone to try something different if you lack a fundamental knowledge of what makes it worthwhile?" he asked. Although, working at Atlus, that presents certain challenges: "That said, 'play' and 'finish' mean two different things in this context. Multiple 100+ hour RPGs can be hazardous to your productivity, and so I cannot boast to have finished every Atlus title released during my tenure."

You have to love gaming

Notice a theme yet? If you're not in love with gaming as an industry, this is probably not the job for you. Enthusiasm goes a long way. "I’ve been in love with games as long as I can remember. I started on the PC, with classic Sierra and Lucasarts adventure games, later owning and adoring just about every home console from the NES onward," Jabbari said. "Gaming is my life, in more ways than one. I’m constantly picking up games I've yet to try, be they new releases or classics I passed on previously."

"Atlus might be my first gig in the industry, but in truth, I've been sailing these seas since I had enough coordination to handle a mouse and keyboard."

We spoke with game industry veteran and former Nintendo PR Manager Eric Walter about this issue, and he agreed that being excited by the industry as a whole is crucial. " I can't tell you how many times I've praised competitor's products or mentioned to a reporter, 'you should really talk to so and so at Microsoft or Ubisoft or EA, I'll bet they have an interesting and different take on the topic.' The more media coverage the gaming industry gets—and the better, more well-rounded media coverage—the better we're all going to be. PR people aren't always out for themselves."

What have we learned?

Dealing with many people in the PR business is a painful affair. They only know the bullet points for each game, they become uncomfortable when asked substantial questions, and, way too often, looks are prized over skill. This doesn't have to be the case. By cultivating your own PR team, hiring gamers who honestly love the product and know it well, and staying up to date on the industry as a whole, you're guaranteed to have a PR team that more effectively talks to gaming writers, the mainstream media, and the gamers themselves.

PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE FIX THE ARS CMS ORGANIZATION. I HAD MY DOUBTS AS TO WHETHER THE (LACK OF) ORGANIZATION WAS ACTUALLY RESOLVED, BUT THIS CONFIRMS IT. NOWHERE DOES THIS ARTICLE APPEAR IN ANY ONE OF "NEWS," "GUIDES," "REVIEWS," OR "FEATURES." Perhaps it's simply because it's editorial-ish, and really doesn't fit those categories, that it fails to show up anywhere there, but this should be a testament to how, frankly, poorly thought out, and unprofessional the reorganization continues to be. Think of it this way: when you receive a magazine in the mail, do some of the articles only appear if you read it from the back cover towards the front, and other articles only appear if you stare at the spine for clues as to where to find them? NO! It's simple to navigate a magazine: start at the beginning, and read through to the end, and hell, skip around if you want! You're the master of your own destiny! The articles will still be there if you decide to read them out of order!

I had been reading Ars as 4 different digests since the dust last settled: news, guides, reviews, and features. The fact that certain content does not appear in any of these categories seriously baffles me. Am I doing it wrong? Should I read 15 different categories of news instead? (I.e. Apple, Business, Gadgets...) I'm not a completist, and I don't read the NYT cover to cover, but HOW F---ING HARD IS IT TO GET ALL ARTICLES LISTED IN REVERSE CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER SO I CAN KNOW WHAT IS NEW SINCE I LAST READ? I can get the next day's Times, and hey guess what, all the articles are newer than the previous day's.

Also, why is "all" not all, but a subjective selection of what articles are the most prominent? I guess I just like a sense of stability and organization when I read something. Ars continues to severely disappoint on this front. I started reading WAAAY back in the day with the first articles about the PPC G4's design, and I've been a regular reader for about 6 or 7 years, but I'm frankly so frustrated with the redesign that I though I tolerate what a pain in the ass it is to read ars now, I'm tempted to make ars a "weekly visit" rather than a "daily visit."

This continued lack of organization will only hurt Ars's aspirations towards becoming a professional site. I understand the desire to attract hordes of new casual users, but please don't do this at the expense of your dedicated users. Condé Nast, do you hear me? They're choking out there most dedicated fans' love of the site. How simple is it to make a distinction between "Front Page" and "All" which might some day actually contain All Articles?

Email me if you'd like. I'm sending a copy of this to the site's maintainers.

I apologize for shouting, however I can't find any other way to communicate this. I believe my constructive feedback being in normal caps, and my anger points being in ALL CAPS should help illustrate how I really feel about this whole thing. I've tried other "effective communication strategies," but they all seem to fall on deaf ears. Someone tell me what I'm doing wrong, (and no, not re: the shouting.)

Aram Jabbari can be successful b/c he works for a medium size game company with a specific audience. When Jack Tretton, head of Sony USA PR, speaks, he must be all things to all people. This makes him look like the shill he is. Does meet the three criteria stated in your article? Yes, absolutely. Still, he is not finding success. He fails the "do gamers know your name" test.

"By cultivating your own PR team, hiring gamers who honestly love the product and know it well, and staying up to date on the industry as a whole, you're guaranteed to have a PR team that more effectively talks to gaming writers, the mainstream media, and the gamers themselves."

The mention of PopCap reminds me of their extremely frustrating DRM. I bought Bejeweled 2 for my mom last christmas and installed it on her computer and it's one of those things that requires some kind of mothership license key validation to install. Anyways, got it installed and she played it a few weeks. Then she got a new computer (old one died) and wanted to have the game on that one instead. So installed it and entered the license as before, but it wouldn't accept it. It's a few months back so don't quite remember all the details but it was back and forth with PopCap support but none of it worked. In the end I never got the stupid game to accept the license and decided to delete it and that was that. I can't believe that a company the makes such minor games at basically shareware level has DRM that is worse than Adobe's and much much worse than many other pro level apps. I run the complete Cinema4D suite which costs several thousand dollars and all one is asked to do is enter a serial. Why the f**k does a stupid little game like Bejeweled 2 need this grotesque level of copy control? Obviously I'll be staying away from PopCap's offerings which is sad as they make some really good games. And I can't really recommend anyone else to support a company that treat their customers like criminals to the extent that PopCap does.

Jeppe Utzon, have you considered Steam? They offer all of PopCap games, sometimes even cheaper than released elsewhere at minimal hassle.

The process of installing my whole library of steam games on a new PC is not any harder than running the steam installer, logging in with my account details and double clicking the game I want to play (+download time the very first time, which in case of PopCap games is a few minutes).

Originally posted by AMC:Jeppe Utzon, have you considered Steam? They offer all of PopCap games, sometimes even cheaper than released elsewhere at minimal hassle.

Oh I get it. The problem encountered by the OP was his own fault for having bought the software the wrong way. Thanks for clarifying that, or some of us might have blamed DRM rather than a legitimate paying customer.

Originally posted by AMC:Jeppe Utzon, have you considered Steam? They offer all of PopCap games, sometimes even cheaper than released elsewhere at minimal hassle.

Oh I get it. The problem encountered by the OP was his own fault for having bought the software the wrong way. Thanks for clarifying that, or some of us might have blamed DRM rather than a legitimate paying customer.

How's that jump to conclusions mat working out for you? AMC was simply trying to be helpful by offering an alternative to consider in the future. I'm no fan of DRM either, but I'll admit that Steam is at least a convenient way to deliver it.

Originally posted by bedward:Jeppe: "And I can't really recommend anyone else to support a company that treat their customers like criminals to the extent that PopCap does."

AMC: "Jeppe Utzon, have you considered Steam? They offer all of PopCap games, sometimes even cheaper than released elsewhere at minimal hassle."

But I'm "jumping to conclusions." I didn't realize Steam had fanboys; I stand corrected.

Sorry, but I think maybe you are being unduly harsh with AMC. As I read it he's simply offering an alternative which might have helped with my problems if I hadn't already decided to forego PopCap in the future. Steam might be good for other things also but alas, I haven't tried it.

And if you're the head of Activision, your PR line is "We want to exploit games on a yearly basis because you idiots will keep buying the same stuff over and over again. I also don't care to play our own games".

> Jabbari is near legendary in the world of game writing for press releases that are actually fun to read

Please send him to AutoDesk. Their Marketing Babble is so out of control you can't tell what the hell their stuff does any more. I've been working in CGI for 20 years and apart from HDRI this really this is sheer verbal diarrhea.

"Autodesk® Toxik™ software is a node-based digital compositing and visual effects solution with advanced image processing capabilities. The software’s architecture is built around its ultra-high resolution interaction and high dynamic range imaging (HDRI) core, which allows you to work interactively and intuitively with virtually any visual media, regardless of bit depth or image size."

Oh BTW what it does do is stuff like lens blur and green screen, but fat chance working out that from that drivel.

PS. Yeah the new Ars overhaul sucks. The main site gets caught in a scripting loop on my Firefox, so I use NoScript, which I have to disable to post comments here. Test Moar, guys.

Originally posted by mgillespie:Shame this article did not cover Astroturfing and Viral marketing, 2 things that feature very high on Microsofts dirty tricks campaigns.

Microsoft is hardly alone in using either one of those marketing tactics. Sony is also a firm believer in creating your own buzz.

As for PR folks being responsible for getting high review scores, this may be true from a publisher's perspective, but is anethema to gamers. Getting caught doing the gaming version of payola is a sure way to ruin a publication and does no good for the publisher, either.

Of the PR folks I've dealt with, I respect Pete Hines of Bethesda and his crew quite a bit. They get answers, they don't BS you to death and they speak gamers' English.

Reading this article reminded me of the folks who post computers (or anything they don't know about) for sale ... "Runs GREAT! Clean! No issues! GREAT computer! Looks GOOD!" It just screams of "I'm clueless!" Have had the same from some game PR folks, too. "This game is GREAT! Clean! No issues! Looks GOOD!"

"Dealing with many people in the PR business is a painful affair. They only know the bullet points for each game, they become uncomfortable when asked substantial questions, and, way too often, looks are prized over skill."

If the above statement is true, then you have not been working with real PR people. The successful PR pros you highlighted are living proof, and although they have done amazing things, they are not as rare a breed as you might think. Although I agree with the three basic concepts you highlighted for successful PR in the gaming industry (although I think they apply to any industry on a broad level), I can't shake the bitterness you expressed toward PR professionals on the whole.

True media professionals live, eat, sleep and breathe their clients, whether they work internally or at an outside agency. It is our job to become involved, enthusiastic and authentic consumers and experts. As a person working in the PR field myself, I can tell you that the firm I work for is comprised of very intelligent, honest people, none of whom have ever won a beauty pagent. We wear glasses, earn MBAs, have never worked the door at a party and are always able to pull through for reporters in a timely fashion. Although I work at an outside agency, I am part of every company I represent. Our clients include us in top-level board room discussions and we use every product or service they provide. We like to let our clients speak for themselves as they are the best experts, but feel our guidance and media expertise is essential in helping them clearly deliver their messages to the right audiences. I've worked for three very different firms, all of whom share the same philosophy.

Either you've had some horrible experiences with some very unfortunate people claiming to be "PR professionals", or you've been watching too many episodes of "The Hills."

PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE FIX THE ARS CMS ORGANIZATION. I HAD MY DOUBTS AS TO WHETHER THE (LACK OF) ORGANIZATION WAS ACTUALLY RESOLVED, BUT THIS CONFIRMS IT. NOWHERE DOES THIS ARTICLE APPEAR IN ANY ONE OF "NEWS," "GUIDES," "REVIEWS," OR "FEATURES." Perhaps it's simply because it's editorial-ish, and really doesn't fit those categories, that it fails to show up anywhere there, but this should be a testament to how, frankly, poorly thought out, and unprofessional the reorganization continues to be. Think of it this way: when you receive a magazine in the mail, do some of the articles only appear if you read it from the back cover towards the front, and other articles only appear if you stare at the spine for clues as to where to find them? NO! It's simple to navigate a magazine: start at the beginning, and read through to the end, and hell, skip around if you want! You're the master of your own destiny! The articles will still be there if you decide to read them out of order!

I had been reading Ars as 4 different digests since the dust last settled: news, guides, reviews, and features. The fact that certain content does not appear in any of these categories seriously baffles me. Am I doing it wrong? Should I read 15 different categories of news instead? (I.e. Apple, Business, Gadgets...) I'm not a completist, and I don't read the NYT cover to cover, but HOW F---ING HARD IS IT TO GET ALL ARTICLES LISTED IN REVERSE CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER SO I CAN KNOW WHAT IS NEW SINCE I LAST READ? I can get the next day's Times, and hey guess what, all the articles are newer than the previous day's.

Also, why is "all" not all, but a subjective selection of what articles are the most prominent? I guess I just like a sense of stability and organization when I read something. Ars continues to severely disappoint on this front. I started reading WAAAY back in the day with the first articles about the PPC G4's design, and I've been a regular reader for about 6 or 7 years, but I'm frankly so frustrated with the redesign that I though I tolerate what a pain in the ass it is to read ars now, I'm tempted to make ars a "weekly visit" rather than a "daily visit."

This continued lack of organization will only hurt Ars's aspirations towards becoming a professional site. I understand the desire to attract hordes of new casual users, but please don't do this at the expense of your dedicated users. Condé Nast, do you hear me? They're choking out there most dedicated fans' love of the site. How simple is it to make a distinction between "Front Page" and "All" which might some day actually contain All Articles?

Email me if you'd like. I'm sending a copy of this to the site's maintainers.

I apologize for shouting, however I can't find any other way to communicate this. I believe my constructive feedback being in normal caps, and my anger points being in ALL CAPS should help illustrate how I really feel about this whole thing. I've tried other "effective communication strategies," but they all seem to fall on deaf ears. Someone tell me what I'm doing wrong, (and no, not re: the shouting.)

P.S. Ben, I enjoyed your article.

This appears under "News" for me, maybe it just took a while to show up? There is something odd going on with the title certainly...